….you have to keep moving forward.
2014 has been a turning point year for me. There can’t be many times in an entrepreneurs life that so many things can happen to cause a great amount of change, and for me, both personally and professionally, this has been a year to remember.
Besides getting married which involves all of its own challenges in planning and organisation, I’ve made some big moves in my work and various revenue generating projects that may or may not plan out.
For a start, I decided to kill the old CasinoMan brand and re-launch the data as new websites. CasinoMan has been around since 2001 and for the most part of the last decade as more or less funded the rest of my entrepreneurial life and progress.
But, like anything that stays stagnant and constant, the reality is that it was dying a slow death. I had lost passion to grow the project for about 5 years and as a result it entered into a phase of slow death where year upon year, the revenues were declining.
everything is constantly evolving
My interest moved towards technology and more recently to the new projects which excite me a lot more. That being Mindlogr and Smartmemo, both of which are going concerns now and Mindlogr is even starting to generate real revenues.
The bold decision I decided to take with CasinoMan to kill it, didn’t come lightly, but there is a lesson to be learned, probably more than one lesson.
I’ve long been a voice about passion and doing what makes you tick, but even when you are working in something that excites you, if you don’t continue to grow it, that passion eventually fades because I think inherently humans do seek advancement all the time. It’s built into our nature to want to make progress. After all, we are explorers and adventurers and that trait has lead us to new lands and countries and exploring the planet.
Without this innate characteristic in all us humans, we would never have venture beyond our own shores. The reality is that if this were to happen we’d probably all be bored to death!
Even when you are working on something you think is you passion right now, you need to understand that it may very well not be your complete passion in 5 years time, and knowing that makes a big difference. It allows you to plan forward, to make more progress.
Keep moving forward. That’s what I learnt. If you aren’t moving forward, you are moving backwards by default. There is no constant because it requires just as much energy to remain constant, as it does to move forward.
The other lesson I think I’ve probably learnt is that one has to have bigger dreams and goals and look beyond what is your immediate concern. For most people starting out, money is the immediate concern because of course we all have bills to pay and need money to buy food!
Often I’ve seen entrepreneurs stagnate when they get to a point of comfort where they make enough to eat and live and perhaps even go on the odd vacation here and there, but they lose their energy to want to push harder and take things to the next level. A lot of these entrepreneurs burn out over decades because they eventually realise that all they ever did was create a job for themselves and work it till they retire.
That is the dilemma. How hard must you push? That I guess depends on what you want out of life. Just like anything in life, it all starts with what you want, and being honest with yourself.
I want to hear from anyone who’s had similar experiences, please comment below.
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